🦁 Premier League Player of the Week: Adding injury to insult | OneFootball

On a weekend where two players scored hat-tricks, another provided a trio of assists and a goalkeeper pulled off an all-time classic save, there were plenty of contenders for the week’s star man.

But ultimately our pick for Player of the Week is…

Noni Madueke (Chelsea)

Chelsea’s forward certainly enjoyed an eventful weekend in Wolverhampton.

The night before his side’s fixture at Molineux, he mistakenly posted his thoughts about the local area on Instagram.

Although he was quick to delete his insult, everything lives forever on the internet and eagle-eyed fans quickly spread word of his criticism.

As a result, he was greeted with a hostile reception when taking to the field but he silenced the boo boys in the best way possible.

The 22-year-old was a constant threat from start to finish and his electrifying movement and energy ensured Gary O’Neil’s side could never quite settle.

His direct run and attempt on goal led to the corner kick for the opening goal before his ruthless second half hat-trick helped Chelsea to their first three points of the season and a 6-2 win.

On three separate occasions he was slipped in by Cole Palmer on the right of the penalty area and each time, he kept a calm head to find the back of the net.

It was just the fifth time in Premier League history that a player has scored a hat-trick having had the same team-mate set him up for each of his goals.

Although he was ice cool with each of his strikes, he wasn’t keen to take Palmer’s moniker away from him and in fact offered an alternative.

“He’s cold and I’m fire,” Madueke said. “So we mix well.”

In addition, it also means that he has scored more goals in Wolverhampton, a place he looks to be no fan of, than he has at Stamford Bridge – despite calling that venue his home for 18 months.

To Madueke’s credit, he was much more contrite after walking off with the match ball as he attempted to rid himself of his pantomime villain status.

“I just want to apologise to everyone that I might have offended. It is just a human mistake, an accident. It wasn’t meant to be out on my socials like that. I’m sure Wolverhampton is a nice town and I’m sorry,” he said afterwards, as reported by BBC Sport.

“It was a mistake and you learn from those things. Hopefully nothing like that happens again. In terms of the boos, I expected it but it is part of the game. You have to be able to play under that sort of pressure.”

He certainly revelled under that pressure.

Talk about adding injury on top of insult.